On his first day in office, President Joe Biden famously signed an executive order killing the Keystone XL pipeline, an oil pipeline system first commissioned in 2010 running from northwest Canada to the American heartland and Southern states.
Though the project would have had the capacity to deliver hundreds of thousands of barrels of crude to American refineries a day, Biden stated that the United States “must prioritize the development of a clean energy economy.”
BIDEN’S ALASKA OIL PROJECT APPROVAL IS A GIFT TO THE ENVIRONMENT
Rescinding the project’s permits was dubious from a policy perspective — transporting oil via rail is more expensive, more dangerous, and less environmentally friendly than by pipeline — but Biden’s order should have come as little surprise. During a 2020 presidential debate, Biden was asked if he would “close down the oil industry.”
“I would transition from the oil industry, yes,” Biden replied. “It has to be replaced by renewable energy over time.”
Apparently that’s ancient history.
This week, despite Biden’s pledge to prohibit new oil permits on federal land, he greenlighted a massive drilling program on federal land: ConocoPhillips’s Willow project. As the Associated Press reports, the project will tap reserves from “Alaska’s petr …